Apparently beaver prefer to cut trees that are less than six inches in diameter, and where slender poles abound it is rare for anything to be cut of more than four inches. But it is not uncommon to see trees felled that are from twelve to fifteen inches in diameter. In my possession are three beaver-cut stumps each of which has a greater diameter than eighteen inches, the largest being thirty-four inches. The largest beaver-cut stump that I have ever measured was on the Jefferson River in Montana, near the mouth of Pipestone Creek. This was three feet six inches in diameter. The beaver sits upright with fore paws against the tree, or clasping it; half squatting on his hind legs, with tail either extending behind as a prop or folded beneath him as a seat, he tilts his head from side to side and makes deep bites into the tree about sixteen inches above the ground. In the overwhelming majority of beaver-cut trees that I have seen, most of the cutting was done from one side,--from one seat as it were. Though the notch taken out was rudely done, it was after the fashion of the axe-man. The beaver bites above and below, then, driving his teeth behind the piece thus cut off, will wedge, pry, or pull out the chip. Ofttimes in doing this he appears to use his jaw as a lever. With the aspen, or with other trees equally soft, about one hour is required to gnaw down a four-inch sapling. With one bite he will snip off a limb from half to three quarters of an inch in diameter. After a tree is felled on land, the limbs are cut off and the trunk is gnawed into sections. The length of these sections appears to depend upon the size of the tree-trunk and also the distance to the water, the number of beaver to assist in its transportation, and the character of the trail. Commonly a six- or eight-inch tree is cut into lengths of about four to six feet. If the tree falls into the water of the pond or the canal, it is, if the limbs are not too long, transported butt foremost to the desired spot in its uncut, untrimmed entirety. Ofttimes with a large tree the trunk is left and only the limbs taken.